The Plains of Patagonia. 229 
seems strange in so keen an observer, and one who 
has lived so much with nature and uncivilized men ; 
but it must be borne in mind that his peculiar 
theories with regard to man’s origin—the acquisi- 
tion of large brains, naked body, and the upright 
form not through but in spite of natural selection 
—would predispose him to take such a view. My 
own experience and observation have led me to a 
contrary conclusion, and my belief is that we might 
learn something by looking more beneath the 
hardened crust of custom into the still burning core. 
For instance, that experience I had in Patagonia— 
the novel state of mind I have described—seemed to 
furnish an answer to a question frequently asked 
with regard to men living in a state of nature. 
When we consider that our intellect, unlike that of 
the inferior animals, is progressive, how wonderful 
it seems that communities and tribes of men should 
exist— are contented to exist,” we often say, just as 
if they had any choice in the matter—for ages and 
for thousands of years in a state of pure barbarism, 
living from hand to mouth, exposed to extremes of 
temperature, and to frequently-recurring famine 
even in the midst of the greatest fertility, when a 
little foresight—“ the smallest amount of intelligence 
possessed by the lowest of mankind,” we say—would 
be sufficient to make their condition immeasurably 
better. If, in the wild natural life, their normal 
state is like that into which I temporarily fell, then 
it no longer appears strange to me that they take 
no thought for the morrow, and remain stationary, 
